


Nocturne

by XLoba_Yongx



Series: Gods Among Dragons [1]
Category: Original Work
Genre: Darkfire - Freeform, Dragons, Will update tags as the story continues
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-10
Updated: 2020-12-11
Packaged: 2021-03-09 23:47:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,572
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27994737
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/XLoba_Yongx/pseuds/XLoba_Yongx
Summary: Hunters were dangerous to meddle with. They don’t really like when their plans get meddled with. He understood the risk before he was captured, before freeing countless other dragons they had tried to catch and bring to their dragon fights. He just never anticipated getting caught, not so quickly at least. He had hoped to take a few of them down with him, so that was at least one less hunter for the world to worry about. One less hunter to pass on their ways.He should’ve known better.
Series: Gods Among Dragons [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2050389





	Nocturne

**Author's Note:**

> I wanted to write out a story for this game idea I had a while back.

History books told of a time before the Collision. Back before the disturbance in magic, when the continents were still separate and the dragons ruled the world. The balance between elements was more orderly. More strict. Made more sense. Now, it seemed to cling to whoever, and whatever, had the easiest grip.

Humans were the perfect vessels.

And Darkfire was one of their pawns.

Hunters were dangerous to meddle with. They don’t really like when their plans get meddled with. He understood the risk before he was captured, before freeing countless other dragons they had tried to catch and bring to their dragon fights. He just never anticipated getting caught, not so quickly at least. He had hoped to take a few of them down with him, so that was at least one less hunter for the world to worry about. One less hunter to pass on their ways.

He should’ve known better. Well, he _did_ know better. Fireheart warned him and he _still_ tried to raid that camp, because he thought he could free ten dragons at once on his own and not suffer any consequences.

Well, on the bright side, they hadn’t seemed interested in killing him, at least.

His eyes needed a moment to adjust to the lighting. It was _bright_ . Terrible for his eyes, but he needed to figure out where he was. His first thoughts were that he’d been killed and this was what the afterlife was like (he expected it to be darker… a _lot_ darker), but that thought faded when the ache in his wings and shoulders set in.

He was very much alive, although he had absolutely no idea where he was. Definitely not a cave- the floor was too even. Too smooth. Devoid of cracks and stone, or any sort of patterns really. The walls were identical, as well as the ceiling, save for the circular light carved at its center. If he hadn’t been leaning against one of the walls, he’d have thought the room was going on forever.

It was difficult to move. At first he thought it was from the pain and having been laying still for possibly days on end, but that was when he noticed the metal binding keeping his maw clamped shut. Similar bindings held his wings at his sides, and his ankles bound together.

Then he noticed the little claws protruding from the one in his snout, digging into his scales in a way that would surely leave a scar once it gets removed.

 _Damn it_. Can’t get out that way.

For a single, horrifying second, he wondered if it ever would get removed. He’d never been caught by hunters before. Never met anyone who _has_. What if they’d sold him to a butcher? Was this where dragons were kept before getting slaughtered? Like hell was going down without a fight. Not again. Not for this.

He slammed his tail against the ground, partially to see if his waking grogginess had worn of, but also for the pain to force away whatever of it was left. It stung, but it worked, because he felt it shoot up his spine and neck, returning the feeling there like an unwelcome dunk in cold water.

He tried to shimmy his wings, and to some degree they shifted, but not enough to even move the binding out of place. His ankles were bound too tightly together for him to try and move that one, and he couldn’t reach up to try and pry off the one latched into his snout.

He slammed his tail again, which hurt, but it helped to flip him over on his back, where he now had the binding pressed against the floor and could use as leverage. He tried to shimmy again, this time with more success than before, and he was able to slip it about halfway down his torso, toward his hind legs where his waist was thinner, where his wings were almost able to slip out.

That was when a door seemed to materialize into existence on the wall, like a portal, and a man stepped in.

He seemed a little surprised at the sight of Darkfire, on his back with his wings just about ready to slip out. A ‘little’ was keyword though, because it only took him a second to recover before pulling something out of the inner pocket of his grey suit, and Darkfire realized it was a gun.

His eyes widened at the sight, and panic ebbed in before thought, and next thing he knew he was frantically shaking his body, trying to get his wings out, trying to use his tail to move, trying to twitch his claws like they could do anything, but he could barely even feel them from how tightly they were bound. He was gonna die. Right here. With hardly a fight because he couldn’t break free fast enough.

The man pulled the trigger, but instead of a bullet or a tranquilizing dart or something lethal, instead what shot from its overly wide barrel was…

A collar?

A _shock_ collar. The moment it wrapped around his neck and connected, it zapped him, forcing his muscles to contract and to cease all voluntary movement as it held him still long enough for the man to tuck the weapon back in his suit and walk up to him. Darkfire was expecting the smug look- all hunters are always proud of their catches- but something about the way he smirked felt just a little different.

“Fiesty one, aren’t you?” He said, clearly not expecting a response as he knelt down to get a closer look at Darkfire’s face. The shock from the collar had stopped, but its effects were much stronger than he could fight off, and the most he could do was glare up at the man and try to keep eye contact without twitching so much.

“You’ll do nicely. Darks never last long here- timid things, your kind. They’ve got more flight than fight in em, but you…” The man reached out and took hold of his snout, angling his head to get a better look at his face, before regaining eye contact.

“You’ve got a certain fire in you, I can see it. You might be the solution to our entertainment dilemma.”

 _What?_ So clearly he wasn’t about to die, immediately at least. What does he mean ‘entertainment dilemma?’

“C’mon, let’s get you out of these, you’ve got a big day ahead of you.” The man reached into another inner pocket, pulling out some little whizzing contraption that Darkfire didn’t get to watch work as it loosened the bindings around his ankles enough for him to get out.

His first instinct was to attack immediately. He could’ve slashed his throat and disappeared the moment all his bindings were off. He would’ve, if there wasn’t just one problem.

He felt like his heart was going to stop if he did.

It was strange. The feeling was so sudden and powerful just after he reared his claw back. Nothing in particular changed, just this gut feeling that instantly pacified whatever powerful urge to kill the guy had. He knew for a fact he wasn’t having second thoughts.

_What the-_

“I see you noticed our safety implementation. Hope you don’t mind, didn’t want you killing us in our sleep in the event you managed to escape.” The man nodded toward Darkfire’s chest, and after a great deal of effort in standing up on shaky and still not entirely cooperative limbs, he could see the glint protruding right over where his heart was.

A heart stone.

“Ancient magic right there, learned it from an old friend. Taboo in the dragon world, from what I hear, and it was almost lost in history,” The man chuckled, “Almost.”

If he could move his mouth, Darkfire would’ve been fuming. Literal flames would’ve been shooting from his mouth if he could open it, even if he couldn’t aim it at the man. He’d never seen a heart stone before, only heard about them from his parents and sister, who’d seen what they looked like themselves, and from rumors about the dragon games…

The games.

“Alright, c’mon, we don’t have much time. Like I said, big day,” The man stood and began his walk toward the door, and even though there wasn’t a visible leash, he still felt the tug at his collar, and he was urged forward by an invisible force. With hardly an ability to focus on keeping himself up, he was forced to follow, the man happily keeping an easy pace for him to stay in stride, seemingly aware of how little his legs were working for him.

He tried to stop a couple of times, partially because his vision hadn’t entirely focused in the bright light, but mostly because he was absolutely not about to follow that man out of there. There wasn’t much he could do when he barely had the strength to even lift his wings, let alone hold his ground.

They walked down a hall, far less bright and much more decorated, but still pure white walls and floors, and now Darkfire was able to see into the other rooms- which apparently had one way transparent doors, because despite looking as though the dragons inside could easily escape, none of them were attempting it. None of them were even looking toward them as they walked by either, leading Darkfire to believe their rooms looked exactly like the one he had just been in.

Some of the dragons were in bindings, just like his, unconscious and also looking like they’d put up much more of a fight than him. Then there were some that weren’t bound at all, and were instead simply resting or pacing around their rooms, making no effort to plot or attempt an escape.

Every single one of them had heart stones.

They stopped before a pair of double doors, where the man pressed a button and waited, allowing for Darkfire to take a closer look into one of the rooms and see who was inside.

She was just sitting there, in the center of the room, completely unmoving, eyes closed, as if she were meditating. Or even sleeping. Her eyes twitched when they stopped in front of her room, though, and they opened, and it was almost like she could see them through the door, even though Darkfire knew she surely couldn’t. Could she? She didn’t look like anything special. Just an Electric, a weird one, because she had tail spikes and a bunch of markings that females didn’t usually have, and the yellow of her scales were entirely too bright and Darkfire didn’t really have time to analyze the weird shape of her eyes before the double doors opened to a tiny room, and he was pulled inside.

The doors shut and, after the press of another button on a maze of keys with numbers and symbols Darkfire didn’t recognize, they were sinking, so deep underground that he started feeling the pressure in his ears before they finally stopped, and the doors opened to an absolutely massive cavern, dimly lit, crawling with humans wearing white lab coats and suits, or dragon catching gear, although Darkfire got the distinct impression they didn’t need to use it very often.

“As you probably already know, since you were the scoundrel that’s been freein’ all of me dragons, this whole place is the inner works of the dragon games, thoughtfully named meself,” The man said as he led him down a path that branched into one of the many twisting tunnels. Occasionally, they’d pass another dragon, either in a similar collar as him being led in a different direction, or behind bars with one or two other dragons in smaller, closed off caves.

“Any hunter nowadays can make a dragon fightin ring, but no other pit has a stand against my coliseum. We’re the roar of entertainment, every man wants their name in, every dragon wants theirs out,” The path seemed to go on forever, connecting the underground to gods knew where, but they eventually reached a stop, an empty cave with bars that separated them from the inside. Now that Darkfire was actually looking at them, they looked easy to slide through. What kind of-?

“Go on in,” He was nudged forward, and against his better judgement (or rather, against his will really) he stepped forward, feeling the weight of his collar disappear when he stepped through the bars, and also feeling something strange wash over him once he was all the way through, although it disappeared moments later.

“Make yourself at home for the next hour or so. If you’re still alive by the end of the week then there’s a champion’s feast and a nice room with your name on it,” The man leaned against the bar, looking more smug by the second, “Oh, and, if you happen to find yourself at death’s door, try to at least make it interestin’. Keeps some of the fans comin’ back, although stayin’ alive also helps with that.”

He pushed away from the bars, turning his back on Darkfire and the cave and lifting a hand up, something of which was being held in it, too small for Darkfire to see, even in the dark.

“Also, try to get along with your team. Or don’t. Like I said- just stay interestin’.” He pushed a small button, and the tension around Darkfire’s snout and wings instantly loosened, the bands falling off and disappearing like old magic in the blink of an eye.

And in that same blink of an eye, Darkfire leaped forward, mouth hissing with darkened flames aimed straight for the man’s back, wings already beating and propelling him forward, ready to dart through the bars and itching to escape.

That was, before that feeling of dread came back. The feeling like he was going to die if he so much as took another step, and he instantly stopped, just before touching the bars.

“What the…” He looked down to see the heart stone glowing, a dangerous deep purplish black that almost fumed with malicious energy. He looked back at the bars, seeing a slight glow in a similar color, and seeing the man glance over his shoulder, flashing him a wicked smirk, teeth and all, before disappearing around a corner.

Darkfire was left in dark silence, save for the crackling of a single torch illuminating the outer hall somewhere not very far from where he had entered the cave.

He hissed to himself, angrily sweeping his tail across the ground as he turned his back to the bars. He stomped against the ground, tossed his head to either side and let blackened flames spurt from his nostrils.

In his fit of anger, of growling and cursing the man and the hunters, and the dragon games and every enemy he was likely about to face, he failed to notice the other presence in the shadows. A pair of eyes, bright orange and almost glowing in the darkness, watched him pace around the entrance as he tried to will himself another way out.

By the time he did notice them, they had already made their way to the edge of the darkness, easily sneaking up behind him before a heavy exhalation of breath startled him to their presence.

There was another dragon in there with him.

**Author's Note:**

> This story is probably confusing, but details about the world, the games, and everything will show themselves as I continue to tell the story. I'm not a big fan of explaining everything right off the bat.
> 
> Any feedback? Confused? Questions? Shoot em my way.
> 
> Also this is Darkfire: https://toyhou.se/9075650.nocturne


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